American Progress Report: The 9/11 Commission Strikes Back: August 4th, 2004

The Commission Strikes Back

This week, President Bush claimed he was embracing the bold institutional changes proposed by the 9/11 Commission by creating this national intelligence director. In reality, he is resisting key elements of the proposal, such as putting the new position in the Cabinet (and thus ensuring the new director would stay in the loop), giving the director the power to hire and fire, or granting the director control of his budget. The result? A weak figurehead without power to effectively oversee the 15 agencies in the U.S. intelligence community. Key 9/11 Commissioners joined members of Congress yesterday to argue that the proposed national intelligence director must have the power to hire, fire, and control a budget. Period.

NO PICKING AND CHOOSING: Commissioners John Lehman, a Republican, and Bob Kerrey, a Democrat, expressed their disapproval to the House Government Reform Committee yesterday. "The person that has the responsibility needs the authority," Kerrey told the Committee. "Absent that, they're not going to be able to get the job done." Lehman was blunt: "Our recommendations are not a Chinese menu. I would strongly recommend that these be viewed as a whole, that the powers needed to carry out these recommendations be enacted as a whole package." Former Republican Sen. Slade Gorton of Washington, a member of the Commission, agreed: ''No one is going to listen to this individual'' absent his or her ability to hire and fire and control budgets.

BUDGET FUNDING: President Bush does not want the new intelligence director to control his own budget. Without the power of the purse, the job lacks the necessary clout to be effective. Lehman flatly stated, "Those powers must be given." And senators yesterday agreed. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, (D-WV), vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, questioned Bush's decision, saying that "if the new director cannot control the budgets of intelligence agencies, this new position will be no more than window dressing." Republican lawmakers backed him up. Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) said: "We ought to take the bull by the horns, create this new national director . . . and really provide some authority, including budget authority." Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), a former chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, agreed, charging the new director must be "someone with total control and accountability. That's the budget too."

HIRED AND FIRED: President Bush's approach would not allow the new director to have the power to hire and fire. Lehman said yesterday, "He has to have hiring and firing power, and not just budget coordination authority but budget appropriations and programming authority." True, said Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA). "If you don't have the authority to pick the people, isn't a national director just a shell game and a shell operation?" Sen. Henry Waxman (D-CA) heartily agreed: "in this city, if you have a fancy title but you are not in the chain of command and you don't control the budget, you are a figurehead, and another figurehead is not what the 9/11 Commission recommended and what our nation needs."

RUMSFELD THE ROADBLOCK: Much of the opposition to an effective director of intelligence can be chalked up to a turf war. Bush's decision to limit the proposed intelligence chief's authority came after lobbying by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who has been adamantly against the creation of a centralized intelligence czar. In his testimony before the Commission in March, Mr. Rumsfeld said then that an intelligence czar would do the nation "a great disservice" by creating reliance on a single, centralized source of information. It would also reallocate funds; currently, 80% of the estimated $40 billion spent on intelligence in the U.S. is under the control of Rumsfeld's Department of Defense. Democratic Commissioner Bob Kerrey didn't mince words, saying since the Defense Department opposed the proposal, "next time there's a dust-up and there's a failure, don't call the director of Central Intelligence up here. Kick the crap out of DOD because they're the ones with the statutory authority over budget."

FIRST DO NO HARM: Creating a director of intelligence while hamstringing his power would be counterproductive to overall intelligence efforts. The 9/11 Commission Staff Director Philip D. Zelikow – who served on Bush's 2001 transition team for the National Security Council – says there's no room for compromise when it comes to national intelligence: "Creating a national intelligence director that just superimposes a chief above the other chiefs without taking on the fundamental management issues we identify, is a step that could be worse than useless." The Director of the Intelligence Policy Center at the RAND Corporation agreed: "If it's set up correctly it has the potential to be a good idea. Otherwise it will be more harmful if we had not done it at all…Because it will create another layer of bureaucracy which will add to the already complex structure that already oversees intelligence."

EDITORIAL PAGE: The New York Times this week sided with lawmakers and 9/11 Commissioners in chastising President Bush's foot dragging. "At a time when Americans need strong leadership and bold action, President Bush offered tired nostrums and bureaucratic half-measures…He wanted to appear to be embracing the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, but he actually rejected the panel's most significant ideas, and thus missed a chance to confront the twin burdens he faces at this late point in his term: the need to get intelligence reform moving whether he's re-elected or not, and the equally urgent need to repair the government's credibility on national security."

LAWMAKER, HEAL THYSELF: While Congress is rightly pressing the administration to implement the Commission's recommendations, Republican lawmakers are also reluctant to make any internal changes. The New York Times reports, "The Senate leadership has yet to identify members of a select working group who are supposed to map a plan for streamlining Congressional oversight. The Republican chairmen of the House and Senate armed services committees - two panels that might have to relinquish significant power - have not offered their views." Several lawmakers admonished their colleagues not to let political considerations play a part in internal restructuring: "We have to make sure we are driven more by 9-11 than by 11-2," said Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL). At least one congressional Republican promises he'll fight for the overhaul, however. Rep. Chris Shays (R-CT) said, "I will not vote for any rules of the House next year that don't create this strong oversight."